Tuesday, November 27, 2012

PVE-gear for a Raidfinding Windwalker Monk

Leveling and upgrading is what we do in World of Warcraft. We level to 90, we level our professions, reputations, Battle Pets, Achievement Points, and we level our gear.

With every expansion it all gets reset, so we can have new goals to work against. And with every raid patch our gear "resets" in the same way. The next "reset" will be 5.2, which I assume will be here in 2 to 4 months. Until then I want to make sure my monk gets as strong as she can. Cause that is what I do. What are my limitations? I can do Raid Finder and Sha of Anger. I need to be lucky to get to do Galleon. I'm Revered with everyone (not Operation: Shieldwall yet of course, but that's only a matter of time), so I will have access to all gear purchasable with Valor Points. And I don't mind spending a bit of gold (30k-ish on a piece max).

I have observed that the gear now isn't very good itemized. There's a lot of weird sockets, socket bonuses, set bonuses and stats. This is something that usually happens in the start of the expansion; the first tier has bad itemization, and it improves with each tier. It is this way to make sure that the next tier of gear will always be an upgrade, not only cause of item level but also cause of itemization. For example now it seems like most of the Valor Point- and tier-gear has hit on it. Luckily we can reforge 40 % of it to other stats, but I can easily see myself getting stuck with more hit than I want. Hit and expertise are completely useless after they are capped. Stat priorities are given below, but these also change as your gear changes. To help with reforging you can use ingame addons like Reforgenator or ReforgeLite, or you can use websites like AskMrRobot or WoW Reforge.

Two months into the expansion, what is the best way to spend Charms, Valor Points and/or gold?

What you need to decide

Do you want to go for dualweilding or a twohander?
Dualweilding supposedly gives 2-3 % higher DPS than using a twohander, assuming you have the same item level weapons. This is a small enough difference that if you prefer to use a twohander, of course you can! Your ultimate goal will be to get the Sha-Touched weapons in either category.

Do you want to go for tier 14 4set bonus?
Energizing Brew regenerates 60 Energy over 6 sec. The bonus changes this to regenerate 110 Energy over 11 sec. When I get Energy-starved, it's usually more than sufficient to me to use Energizing Brew, and thus I don't see the benefit of this. But as I only quest and do heroics/scenarios/raid finder, I don't really know if it gets more useful in PVP or higher raiding.

Do you want to go for tier 14 2set bonus?
There is some talk in the forums that the tier bonuses aren't really good. People are struggling with Fists of Fury; not being able to use it on cooldown as it is, because of it's lower priority in our rotation. And as soon as the boss moves, you actually stand there shadowboxing. Which looks cool of course, but it's not very useful in killing the boss. Make the decision based on how your rotation usually turns out, and what other gear comes your way.

The best way to spend Charms

Eventually it might be a good way to have one Charm saved up in case Galleon should spawn. But for starters when you need ALL the gear, decide which pieces you want from Raid Finder or Sha of Anger based on what is "Best in Slot", but also which pieces will be the biggest upgrade. If you have 450 PVP-legs, try to use your charms to get legs. Weapons contribute a lot to our DPS, so try getting them as soon as possible. Late in the patch, when there's only one thing you need, you can do the same boss several times per week and use one Charm each time. This is only possible in Raid Finder, not for world bosses.

The decision to use the Charm has a short timer! So don't get caught by surprise. :) Decide on what you want in advance, or keep a short overview (like this one) open while you're in Raid Finder.

Now that Valor Points can be used to upgrade gear, I suggest using Valor Points on 1st) Best In Slot-gear and 2nd) Upgrade Best In Slot-gear, starting with the really best ones, as you'll probably keep them the longest.

The best way to spend gold on gear

Keep an eye on Black Market Auction House. If you're lucky you might be able to get a heroic gear piece from there! Decide on your max price before you start bidding though, it's easy to get carried away...

Both Chestguard of Nemeses and Murderer's Gloves are good! But if you have decided to try to get tier 14 4set bonus, you can't get them both. I want the gloves myself, cause I'm stuck with the Justice Points ones. But I'm kind of holding off on it, cause I'm worried I will get the tier gloves from Sha of Anger IMMEDIATELY upon having them crafted. ;-)

It's really difficult to value trinkets. And it comes up to personal preference in the end. Make sure to use "on use"-trinkets together with Tigereye Brew, Xuen, Virmen's Bite, Synapse Springs etc. Or if you have a "proc"-trinket, use your other cooldowns when it procs. These trinkets are not listed in the order from best to worst, but after item level. Just cause I really can't tell which is best and worst.